One of the greatest challenges of the Trans Siberian Railway is planning the trip. Preparation is di

I had nothing but questions before I set off for my first trip on the Trans Siberian Railway: How do you spend 8 days on a train? Is it dangerous? What condition is the train in? Who are the other riders and what s it like to share a train car with them? What are Siberian cities like? And on and on
Now, several months after completing my second trip on the Trans Siberian Railway and after a combined 2 months of traveling through Russia, China, and Mongolia, many of those questions have been answered. Yet the Railway remains as intriguing a journey as ever for me because each trip is unique, from the people you ll meet on the train cars, to the cities in which you choose to stop, to the way you handle the inevitable challenges as you make your way across Europe and Asia.
One of the greatest challenges of the Trans Siberian Railway is planning the trip. Preparation is difficult because a trip of this scope requires planning through all of Russia and maybe China and Mongolia as well (depending on your route). There s no single source of information covering everything you need to know. Planning ahead is key because once there you ll find bureaucracy, language barriers, and harsh weather combine to work against the unprepared traveler.
Without doing a detailed breakdown, big bus tour london I spent about $3000 USD each of my trips on the Trans Siberian Railway. big bus tour london This included everything except airfare. big bus tour london You can spend a bit less than that if you stick to eating in.
The Trans Siberian Railway is the generic name given to the train tracks passing big bus tour london through Siberia. Riding on any part of these tracks even for a short distance constitutes a trip on the Trans Siberian. Travelers usually complete the entire journey in the classic sense, big bus tour london going from one end to the other along one of three major routes: the Trans Mongolian big bus tour london between Moscow and Beijing by way of Mongolia, the Trans Manchurian between Moscow and Harbin, China, or the Trans Siberian route between Moscow and Vladivostok.
I ve done both the Trans Mongolian and Trans Siberian routes, and I recommend the Trans Mongolian big bus tour london for first timers because you ll travel through three countries and get to experience the culture of each. The classic Trans Siberian route is worthwhile if you want to spend all your time in Russia and don t want to miss out on the far eastern cities of Khabarovsk and Vladivostok., while the big draw to the Trans Manchurian is the city of Harbin, China, where a beautiful ice festival takes place every winter.
It doesn t matter if you go east or west, but most travelers tend to start in Moscow and travel east. I ve done both directions big bus tour london and I preferred westbound because the time changes were easier to handle. The minimum travel big bus tour london time is 8 days on the train, but plan on at least a month if you want to stop off along the way. This works fairly well as Russian tourist visas are limited to 30 days (28 if your intended stay includes any part of February Russian bureaucracy at it s finest). A month sounds like a long time, but it s really not. As you begin researching your stops and coordinating your train schedules, you ll quickly find that any Trans Siberian trip is an exercise big bus tour london in compromise if you re to stay within Russia s 30 day tourist limit.
Lonely Planet big bus tour london s Trans Siberian Railway big bus tour london  is useful as is the Trans-Siberian Handbook by Bryn Thomas. I planned and traveled with both, but if I had to choose just one it d be the Trans Siberian big bus tour london Handbook big bus tour london no question about it (even though I love me some Lonely Planet). Thomas big bus tour london expertly written, well traveled advice goes deeper than the typical where to stay and what to eat of Lonely Planet s guidebook. More than that, he provides an extremely well researched background and history of the railway in addition to kilometer markers so you can track your progress along the way. Also handy are Lonely Planet s destination specific books including Beijing, Mongolia, and Russia.
You hardly need to become fluent in Russian, but it s important that you learn Cyrillic, their written alphabet. It s a bit odd learning how to pronounce words when you don t understand their meaning, but believe me that it s absolutely necessary for any Trans Siberian traveler. Russian maps and street signs are all written in Cyrillic while English language guidebooks typically use our A-Z alphabet to label the same things. It s vital to be able to translate the two. You can learn Cyrillic for free online or buy an English-Russian translation book.
I used  Real Russia  for both of my Trans Siberian trips, and I found the website and service to be top notch. The ability to research individual legs and see how much the tickets cost in advance was particularly handy. Plan on between $1200-$1500 for second class train tickets along the entire big bus tour london route depending on how many times you want to stop. Don t bother purchasing meals in advance; each train has a restaurant car attached, or you can bring your own food and save money.
What you bring is entirely dependent on the season in which you ll be traveling. Siberian summers are reliably warm but mosquito filled. Early fall is cool but pleasant, with temperatures plummeting rapidly as late fall is approached. By the end of October you ll begin to experience temperatures colder big bus tour london than what most cities call winter, and from November through late March you can expect to travel through the coldest weather of your life. Even Canadians and Scandinavian readers who might otherwise thumb their red, frostbitten noses at such a statement should be warned that Siberia is quite literally big bus tour london the coldest place on our planet outside of Antarctica.
Siberian weather big bus tour london fluctuates big bus tour london wildly depending on season, but temperatures on the train are another big bus tour london story. The trains are always kept well heated (sometimes overly so) even in cold weather. It s a performance art on par with the Bolshoi Ballet to be able to board a crowded train compartment and change into comfortable attire when coming in from a frozen Siberian landscape outside. While I ve never been able to make it look good, I have learned big bus tour london to at least be efficient about it. My best advice is keep your sandals and other necessities near the top of your luggage, and dress in layers so you can more easily change into something more comfortable.
I photographed everything big bus tour london I saw in China, Russia, and Mongolia, and I never had a single issue or question raised, nor did I ever feel even remotely threatened. The worst that happened is I attracted a bit more attention as I walked through the train car with my big DSLR, and I caught a few eyes as I took pictures on the streets of some Siberian cities. This is no different from any other city in which I ve taken pictures. big bus tour london In fact, I had more questions big bus tour london from the customs people on my connection in Amsterdam than I did on the journey itself.
Still, basic common sense applies: no military installations, no uniformed big bus tour london police, and use discretion when photographing things make the places look particularly bad like trash and graffiti. Perhaps these awarenesses big bus tour london aren t ingrained in many western photographers minds, but they re important to remember when traveling to many non western countries.
So, what to bring? To be very general, China, Russia, and Mongolia have no special photographic needs beyond what you d normally bring on any other trip. The vast majority of my travel big bus tour london pictures big bus tour london were shot at wide to medium focal lengths of less than 105mm on my full frame camera, and less than 50mm on my 1.6x crop camera . Bringing a long, heavy zoom like the 70-200mm isn t necessary unless you plan on spending a lot of time in the countryside (Mongolia in particular is home to beautiful landscapes and wildlife.) Don t leave without a tripod and remote shutter release cable , extra batteries, plenty of memory cards, big bus tour london and a neutral density filter . One of the best things about the Trans Siberian Railway is there s no real limit to what you can bring on the train so long as you don t mind lugging your gear around.
One of the biggest draws to the Trans Siberian is the unknown. You can plan every detail from hotels to itineraries but the experiences you ll have are sure to be all your own. Here are some of the things I found to be true throughout each of my trips.
Trains are in great condition, and they re continually kept clean by the provodnitsas or train car attendants. Each car has two bathrooms (one at each end), one samovar for hot potable water, and most cars have schedules big bus tour london printed big bus tour london in Cyrillic and in Moscow time. Sleeping berths in second class have four beds and barely enough space for one person to maneuver in the center big bus tour london area at a time.
Because riding any train along any portion of any of the three routes constitutes a trip on the Trans Siberian Railway, there is no actual Trans Siberian train. The closest big bus tour london you ll find is the #1 and #2 россия / Rossiya trains which travel between Moscow and Vladivostok, and can be ridden straight big bus tour london through.
A good rule of thumb for booking your trains is that the lower train numbers provide better, faster service, while higher train numbers big bus tour london are slower and older (especially those with triple digits). Named passenger trains like Rossiya and Baikal are good options when available.
Don t ever let anyone tell you Russians aren t friendly. Big city  Muscovites  can be a bit rude, sure, but on the whole Russia is home to some of the friendliest and most hospitable people I ve ever met . The key is breaking through their seemingly tough, weathered exteriors and getting to know them as individual people. This is easy to do on the train as you ll be sharing the car with locals. Bring food and drinks for them (although they likely won t accept), accept what is offered to you, and make whatever conversation you can. It s likely you ll make fast friends, and you ll have a far more entertaining big bus tour london journey than if you just keep to yourself.
Chinese food is arguably the best and most varied of the three countries, but Mongolian food is quite good as well. Try the Mongolian big bus tour london Бууз